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This introductory section may be a bit overwhelming, but is an overall look at verbs. The majority of this section will be covered in later chapters. Nevertheless, looking over this chapter may help you to familiarize yourself with verbs.

Verbs are parts of speech which denote action. There are two main forms of verbs in Latin:

• Principal Verbs (the main verb which is found in every sentence. e.g.,: vir ambulat = the man is walking)

• Adjectival Verbs (also known as participles, gerunds and gerundives which describe the state of the described noun. e.g.,: vir ambulans = the walking man. The verb behaves as an adjective)

Every sentence must have a verb. In a sense, the principal verb is the sentence and all the nouns, adverbs and participles are only describing the scenario of the verb. Thus in Latin this constitutes a sentence:

est.

If you want to explain 'who' is or exists, you add a nominative substantive:

Cornēlia est.

We now know Cornelia 'is'. But what is she? So we add an adjective.

Cornēlia est bona.

Now we can see that Cornelia is good, but to elaborate further we can add an adverb:

Cornēlia vix est bona.

Now we know that Cornelia is 'hardly' (vix: hardly, scarcely, barely) good.

Verbs in Latin are inflected to reflect the person who performs the action. English does the same to some extent in the verb to be:

Latin

English

sum

I am

es

You are

est

(He/she/it) is

sumus

We are

estis

You (all) are

sunt

They are

Latin, however, inflects all verbs, and is much more extensive than English, allowing writers and speakers of Latin to often drop the personal pronoun (as mentioned last lesson), as the performer of the action is understood by the formation of the verb. The Personal pronoun is only usually added for emphasis. In a way, the ending on Latin verbs are a type of pronoun.

Tense in Latin comprises two parts: TIME and ASPECT. Time reflects when the action is occurring or did occur: past, present, or future. Aspect refers to the nature of the action: simple, completed, or repeated. The "completed" aspect is generally termed "perfective" and repeated aspect "imperfective."

Theoretically, a verb could have nine tenses (combinations of time and aspect). However, Latin only has six, since some possible combinations are expressed by the same verb forms. Latin tenses do not correspond exactly to English ones.

Below is a rough guide to tense in Latin.

Time

ASPECT

Present

Future

Past

Simple

Present Tense"I walk"

Future Tense"I will walk"

Perfect Tense"I walked"

Imperfective

Present Tense"I am walking"

Future Tense"I will be walking"

Imperfect Tense"I was walking"

Perfective

Perfect Tense"I have walked"

Future Perfect Tense"I will have walked"

Pluperfect Tense"I had walked"

As is evident, some Latin tenses do "double duty." The Latin Present and Future Tenses can either express simple or progressive aspect. Particularly difficult to grasp is the Latin Perfect tense, which can either express an action completed from the point of view of the present ("I have just now finished walking"), or a simple action in past time (its "aorist" sense, from the old Indo European aorist tense, which Latin lost but is still present in Greek).

The infinitive (impersonal) is the form of the verb which simply means 'to (verb)' e.g. 'to do', or 'to be', or 'to love', or 'to hate' etc. All forms which are not in the infinitive are in the finite (personalised) form.

The infinitive has a -re at the end of the stem of the verb. The infinitive of 'to be' is an exception and is 'esse'.

In case you do ever use a personal pronoun to emphasise the SUBJECT of the verb, you must remember that the personal pronoun must be in the nominative case and the number and person of the verb must match that of the subject. (Review Lesson 7 if unfamiliar with the terms person and subject).

All nouns are given in the nominative, as well as the declension and gender of the noun. Verbs are alphabetized using the 1st person singular (the first principal part) and the infinitive is given. Supplementary principal parts are given if the various other principal parts do not follow the standard pattern of formation from the infinitive and 1st person singular.

'porto' can also be translated 'I am carrying' (present imperfect), 'I do carry' (present emphatic). 'I carry' is known as the 'present simple' tense in English.. Again the 'a' gets dropped when the 'ō' is placed on porta. Porta, and ama are known as 1st conjugation verbs; in other words, verbs which have a stem ending in 'a'.

There are three other conjugations, and below are some examples of verbs from each of the four conjugations (present imperfect tense):

porta, carry (1st. Conj)

mone, warn (2nd Conj)

rege, rule (3rd Conj.)

audī, hear (4th Conj)

portō, I carry

moneō, I warn

regō, I rule

audiō, I hear

portās, thou carriest

monēs, thou warnest

regis, thou rulest

audis, thou hearest

portat, he/she/it carries

monet, he/she/it warns

regit, he/she/it rules

audit, he/she/it hears

portāmus, we carry

monēmus, we warn

regimus, we rule

audimus, we hear

portātis, ye carry

monētis, ye warn

regitis, ye rule

auditis, ye hear

portant, they carry

monent, they warn

regunt, they rule

audiunt, they hear

Each verb uses the same final letter or letters to indicate the 'subject' - I, thou, he/she/it, we, you, they.

Before these final letters, the first conjugation has an 'a' (although when an 'o' is placed, the 'a' is often dropped), the second an 'e', and the third and fourth usually an 'i'. The third person plural forms in the third and fourth conjugations have a 'u'. These verb forms really should be learned by heart.

The most common verb of all is irregular (see next lesson). Here is a table of the verb 'to be' in Latin, English, and four Romantic languages (French, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese)

esto: be

Latin

English

French

Spanish

Italian

Portuguese

sum

I am

je suis

yo soy

sono

eu sou

es

thou art

tu es

tú eres

sei

tu és

est

he/she/it is

il/elle est

él/ella es

è

ele/ela é

sumus

we are

nous sommes

nosotros/-as somos

siamo

nós somos

estis

ye are

vous êtes

vosotros/-as sois

siete

vós sois

sunt

they are

ils/elles sont

ellos/-as son

sono

eles/elas são

The personal endings are the same as in the four regular conjugations.

The imperative mood conveys an order (e.g. Go!, Run!, Away Now!). The imperative mood is formed by simply using the stem of the verb. If the order is to a large group of people, or you are trying to show respect, you must use the -te suffix.